Failed the test, but graduating anyway

May 25, 2013|By KIM KILBRIDE | South Bend Tribune

More than 2,000 local students are graduating from high school in the coming weeks. If this year's class is like recent ones, more than one in 10 graduates has not met one of the state graduation standards.

Nonetheless, those students will be handed diplomas because Indiana law allows local administrators to give a waiver to students who don't pass required graduation tests but meet other criteria.

In South Bend schools in 2012, 13 percent of students graduating with a diploma didn't pass either or both algebra 1 and 10th-grade English End of Course Assessments.

At Penn, a large, suburban high school, 11 percent of students didn't pass the tests.

And at Mishawaka High School, the number for 2012 matched the statewide average of about 8 percent.

Of the three largest school systems in St. Joseph County, Washington High School had the highest rate for a non-alternative high school. There, 18 percent of students were given waivers in 2012.

One lawmaker says such liberal use is not what the legislature had in mind when it created the waivers.

But some school administrators say they're only acting within the law by allowing students who've passed algebra 1 and 10th-grade English and met other criteria to graduate.

Arguments for and against waivers

Rep. Bob Behning, R-Indianapolis, who leads the House Education Committee, said when the waivers provision was put into effect, lawmakers never anticipated more than 2 percent to 3 percent of students would receive them.

They were intended, he said, for students with learning disabilities or test anxiety so severe it would be difficult for them to pass graduation tests.

"When you're doing anything close to 15, 18 percent," Behning said, "that becomes a pretty significant percentage of kids you're putting out into the world saying, 'Yeah, we're going to give them a diploma,' and they're going to walk into an employer and find they don't have the skill set.

"It's not sending the message to the world of 'yes, we believe a diploma means something.' Basically, a diploma has no value. An employer has no way of knowing if a person received a waiver diploma or a traditional one.

South Bend Superintendent Carole Schmidt has a different point of view.

The district, she said, operates under the parameters of the law when it comes to doling out waivers.

"Secondly," she said, "I think putting this much emphasis on one test means we're discounting the overall learning of a child.

"I think there are numerous considerations when we talk about waivers," she said. Are they "a good thing? A bad thing? Is a high percentage OK?"

"Is it a good thing for kids? I think it becomes situational. It's more complex than saying it's a good thing or a bad thing."

As for the number of waivers given out by South Bend schools, Schmidt said, "We fall within the same range, for many of our schools, as Pennand Mishawaka."

In 2012, 11 percent of Penn High School seniors received waivers and 8 percent of those at Mishawaka High School did so.

In South Bend the same year, waiver rates ranged from 5 percent to 22 percent.

And only one school -- Riley, where 5 percent of seniors were given waivers -- posted a lower percentage than Penn or Mishawaka.

John Ritzler, director of research & evaluation for South Bend schools, pointed out that schools receive A through F grades based on the number of students who pass standardized tests.

So, giving waivers to those who don't pass is not something the district takes lightly.

"But down the road, the real question," Ritzler said, is: "Is what are we doing to help students master all the material they need to master?"

Penn High School Principal Steve Hope attributed the higher percentage of students receiving waivers in 2012 (11 percent) from the 7 percent who did so in 2011 to a rise in enrollment in the school's alternative program.

The majority of these students didn't pass the algebra 1 and English 10 ECAs, he said.

Hope said he expects more Penn students to pass the graduation tests going forward.

"Of those students who do not pass the initial ECAs," he said, "over 60 percent are now passing before they graduate.

"We expect our graduation rate to stay in the mid-90s," he said, "and our waiver rate to fall to 5 to 7 percent."

Changes coming

Behning, the state representative, said legislation passed this session will help ensure waivers are used as the legislature intended.

For one, the state board of education, as well as the Indiana Department of Education will have the authority to require schools to develop remediation plans for students.

"We didn't add a lot of specificity," Behning said of that part of the law, "but we left it so that they have the tools to force schools to deal with the issue."

Also, schools will have to identify in advance students they believe are least likely to pass the ECAs and give them a test that determines proficiency in the areas of English and algebra.

"With that," Behning said, "they are to focus their time and energy in the traditional classroom making sure students are remediated during the school day."

What's more, for students who receive waivers and want to go to college, they'll be required to first successfully complete a remediation course at Ivy Tech Community College before they'll be eligible for any state financial assistance.

"Statistically," Behning said, "we know that generally students don't complete programs if they don't have the skill set. We don't want them to waste state dollars."

With all of those things in place, Behning said, he hopes to see the number of waivers statewide go down.

Last year, former State schools Superintendent Tony Bennett, a Republican, told The Tribune he didn't believe there was statewide misuse of waivers but rather "pockets of overuse," including at Washington High School, where in 2011, nearly one in four graduating seniors received a waiver.

"The concern for me, first of all," he said at the time, "is that the ECA is really a minimum standard test. To pretend for one minute that this is a test that is too aspirational for high school students is really a misplaced argument.

"We're not asking students to perform extraordinary feats by illustrating proficiency."

The spokesman for current state schools Superintendent and Democrat Glenda Ritz didn't respond to several requests for Ritz or someone else from the Indiana Department of Education to discuss the prevalence and appropriate use of graduation waivers.

The Tribune also asked the Indiana DOE for a list of schools whose graduation rates were audited and, as a result, recalculated in recent years.

On Friday, eight days after the initial request, an Indiana DOE staff member e-mailed to say the request is being reviewed.

A Tribune survey of high schools in South Bend and Mishawaka, however, revealed that none had their graduation rates recalculated to a lower number after an audit in the past four years.

Behning said the waivers issue has been strongly debated among lawmakers.

"One of my colleagues (once) said, 'You've never talked to a student and said, "You're not going to be able to graduate from high school." ... The tears they shed.'

"No, I haven't," Behning said. "But what happens when a child goes out into the real world and finds, 'I've got a diploma, but I'm not going to ... get a job with any basic living type of wage?'

"Waivers are not supposed to be thrown around as an alternative for kids who couldn't meet the rigor," Behning said. "Somehow, we've got to make schools aware that this is something we don't want to tolerate."